- 17 Mar
- 2020
ANNE FRANK PROGRAMME AND WORKSHOPS
During this term, Platanos College were fortunate to work, once again, in collaboration with the Anne Frank Trust – an organisation promoting the message that discrimination and prejudice have no place in society today.
Anne Frank was a Dutch-Jewish teenager who died at the age of 15 in the Bergen-Belsen Concentration Camp. Her tragic death in February 1945 (three months before the end of World War Two) became memorialised when her father decided to publish Anne’s diary. This diary conveyed to the world a valuable lesson about what happens when discrimination becomes widespread within our communities, or around the world. The Holocaust claimed the lives of at least six million (6,000,000) people.
The Anne Frank Trust set up a temporary exhibition within the school detailing the life of the Frank family, the struggle of going into hiding for two years, and how tragedy struck once the Nazis uncovered the family’s location, leading to Anne’s death. This story is set against the backdrop of the rise of the Nazi Party in Germany during the 1930s.
Anne Frank’s story is one which resonates with us today as prejudice and discrimination are still powerful forces in the world around us. This can be seen just by listening to the news.
A group of 20 students were chosen from our Year 9 to become Peer Guides. They were trained to explain portions of the exhibition to other students in Years 7, 8 and 9. The subject matter was explained with sensitivity, but introduced our younger students to a reality of human nature.
Over a two week period students in Key Stage 3 were exposed to the story of Anne Frank and were led around the exhibition by our knowledgeable guides. Students were able to ask the Peer Guides questions about Anne’s life and the Holocaust. Our Key Stage 3 students showed curiosity and engagement in the exhibition and impressed the organisers from the Anne Frank Trust who trained our Guides.
It was a delight to see our Year 9 students grow in confidence when explaining the story, as well as becoming emboldened to challenge discrimination and prejudice. All of the Year 9 students also attended a follow up workshop on the theme of discrimination today.
Not only did students learn about a valuable lesson from history, they worked on their skills of presentation and leadership.
Students were overwhelmingly positive about the learning gains they made from being involved in the project. Many explained that they learnt more about themselves from taking part and felt more confident about standing up and leading.
This year, our group of Peer Guides were certainly impressive. They presented their sessions with maturity and sensitivity. They were able to work in teams to organise their individual roles. Members of staff who attended the exhibition conveyed how captivated they were by the Peer Guides’ work. These students have already completed work on their next steps – planning an assembly which will be presented to Year Groups in the school.
We hope that the project proved memorable and will stay with students for life. Ensuring their own perceptions and actions within the modern world will reflect values of tolerance, respect, and equality for all. We are very proud of our students and our community, and the Anne Frank workshops represented the very best of our values at Platanos College.
